Bill C-310 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Criminal Code (trafficking in persons)

This enactment amends the Criminal Code to add the offence of trafficking in persons to the offences committed outside Canada for which Canadian citizens or permanent residents may be prosecuted in Canada.
It also amends the Act to add factors that the Court may consider when determining whether an accused exploits another person.

Criminal Code

[Joy Smith, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

moved that Bill C-310, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (trafficking in persons), be read the third time and passed.

Madam Speaker, I am delighted to have the opportunity to speak to my private member's bill, C-301, an act to amend the Criminal Code (trafficking in persons).

I would like to begin by thanking the member for Ottawa—Orléans who graciously agreed to exchange spots in the order of precedence so Bill C-310 could be debated on March 30, 2012. I also want to thank the member for Kitchener—Conestoga, who without hesitation agreed to exchange spots so that Bill C-310 could be debated today instead of May 31. The selfless actions of these members have allowed Bill C-310 to proceed sooner and place important legal tools into the hands of prosecutors and law enforcement.

I also want to thank the hon. members on the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights for their work on the bill at committee stage.

Bill C-310 would amend the Criminal Code to add the current trafficking in persons offences, 279.01 and 279.011, to the list of offences which, if committed outside of Canada by a Canadian or permanent resident, can be prosecuted in Canada. Bill C-310 would also amend the definition of exploitation in the trafficking and persons offence to add an interpretive aid for courts to consider when they are determining whether a person was exploited.

The first clause of Bill C-310 was amended at justice committee to include the two other human trafficking-specific offences: the material benefit offence in section 279.02 that prohibits receipt of a financial or other material benefit from the commission of a human trafficking offence; and the offence of withholding or destroying documents, such as travel or identity documents, to facilitate human trafficking in section 279.03. This ensures all human trafficking offences are covered by extraterritorial jurisdiction.

The second clause of Bill C-310 recognizes that courts and law enforcement would benefit from an interpretive provision to provide clear guidance on what exploitation consists of. This clause was also amended by the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. The committee's amendment simplified Bill C-310's proposed listing of conduct and made it more consistent with the way other similar clauses in the Criminal Code are drafted. It now reads:

In determining whether an accused exploits another person under subsection (1), the Court may consider, among other factors, whether the accused (a) used or threatened to use force or another form of coercion; (b) used deception; or (c) abused a position of trust, power or authority.

This wording provides clear examples of common exploitive methods used by traffickers in cases of sex trafficking and forced labour. It is also consistent with a similar clause in the Criminal Code and international protocols on human trafficking.

The justice committee also heard from key stakeholders regarding the importance of Bill C-310, including representatives from Walk With Me, Beyond Borders and Dr. Amir Attaran, a University of Ottawa law professor and expert on extraterritorial law.

Timea Nagy, program director of Walk With Me, was herself a victim of human trafficking. She said:

Walk With Me’s position is that this [Bill C-310] is a necessary and desperately needed amendment to the Criminal Code of Canada. ...Conceivably, as the Criminal Code presently stands, a Canadian citizen or a permanent resident could set up an office in eastern Europe and traffic in human persons to Canadian soil without the threat or worry of prosecution when they return to Canada.

Ms. Nagy knows that well because she herself was trafficked from abroad.

Roz Prober, president of Beyond Borders testified. She said:

Beyond Borders early on endorsed this bill, as it includes child sex traffickers.... It is essential, to ensure global justice for children, that Bill C-310 is supported by this committee.

Dr. Amir Attaran, a faculty of law professor at the University of Ottawa, stated:

...Bill C-310 is a very helpful bill. It's necessary. It's constitutional. It definitely should pass....The heart of the bill is really those provisions that clarify the meaning of exploitation and trafficking and that make trafficking a Canadian crime worldwide.

In closing, once again, allow me to express my sincere gratitude to the courageous members who have supported Bill C-310. By working together in this House, we can all effectively combat human trafficking in our country, as well as abroad.

I look forward to your assistance, Madam Speaker, in helping Bill C-310 become law, and I look forward to all members of the House helping Bill C-310 become law just as quickly as possible. Innocent victims are waiting for this.

[The Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

The House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division on the motion to concur in Bill C-310 at report stage under private members' business.

The House resumed from March 30 consideration of Bill C-310, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (trafficking in persons), as amended, be concurred in at report stage.

Human Trafficking

[Joy Smith, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Mr. Speaker, our government recognizes that human trafficking is a despicable crime and that anyone who profits from the modern-day slave trade should face serious consequences.

In recognition of this crime, I recently introduced Bill C-310. Our crown attorneys desperately need this tool in order to prosecute human traffickers wherever they commit their crimes. Unfortunately, last Friday NDP members deliberately delayed the passage of Bill C-310. They deliberately threw it to the bottom of the order paper.

This has become a pattern that is very disturbing. When we look at the record, NDP members have already voted against tougher penalties for child predators, against tougher penalties for child kidnappers and against ending house arrest for serious crimes such as sexual assault.

Last Friday the only muscle that was shown was against the innocent victims of this horrendous crime.

The House proceeded to the consideration of Bill C-310, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (trafficking in persons), as reported (with amendments) from the committee.

Criminal Code

[Joy Smith, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Mr. Speaker, today I have the honour of presenting several hundred petitions in support of my Bill C-310, which will go to third reading today. These petitions were totally unsolicited by me.

I am pleased to see that these people are supporting the bill, as are all members on all sides of the House.

Justice and Human Rights

[Dave MacKenzie, Conservative, Oxford, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the sixth report of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights in relation to Bill C-310, an act to amend the Criminal Code (trafficking in persons). The committee has studied the bill and has decided to report the bill back to the House with amendments.

Protecting Canada's Immigration System Act

[Joy Smith, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to have the opportunity to rise in support of this important legislation. We all know Canada is a compassionate nation. We have a generous spirit that compels us as Canadians to protect the vulnerable.

In fact, Canada has one of the most generous immigration and refugee systems in the world. We resettle approximately 1 in 10 of the world's resettled refugees, more than almost any other industrialized country in the world. We are continuing our tradition as a leader in international refugee protection by increasing the number of refugees resettled from abroad by 20%. By 2013, Canada will resettle up to 14,500 refugees, or 11% of the refugees resettled globally.

The plight of the world's refugees has always moved us to help. Some 30 years ago, people from all walks of life helped to rescue and resettle more than 60,000 Indochinese refugees in Canada. This effort firmly established private sponsorship as a vital component of our refugee program and, in fact, private sponsors across Canada have stepped up and helped more than 200,000 refugees in the past 30 years.

The government is also active with our international partners to help those in need. Take for example, the government's commitment to resettle up to 5,000 Bhutanese refugees from Nepal. We have already welcomed more than 3,600 Bhutanese refugees in several communities across Canada. In addition, we have resettled over 3,900 Karen from Thailand.

Canada has a record of compassion and concern for the world's most vulnerable, a record that we can all be proud of, but we are not pushovers. No Canadian thinks it is acceptable for criminals to abuse Canada's immigration system for financial gain through the crime of human smuggling. It will come as no surprise to anyone in the House that human smuggling is an issue of great importance to me. That is why I introduced Bill C-310, which would amend the Criminal Code to add the offence of trafficking in persons to the list of offences committed outside of Canada that Canadian citizens or permanent residents may be prosecuted for in Canada, among other things. I was very pleased earlier today to appear before the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights as the first witness to appear on its study of my bill.

The simple fact is that our country has become a target for human smuggling. The arrivals of the MV Sun Sea and the Ocean Lady are a clear indication that Canada is a favoured destination for human smuggling networks, and recent international media reports have made it clear that human smugglers continue to target Canada. Just a few weeks ago, the media reported that a massive human smuggling operation headed for Canada was dismantled in Togo. Canada is a prime target for human smugglers. That is why we must take action.

Let us not forget what we are talking about here. Human smuggling is a transnational criminal enterprise that is a growing global phenomenon. Human smugglers consider their passengers to be little more than cargo. Migrants are typically stranded at sea on an overcrowded boat with unsanitary and unsafe conditions. As a result of these inhumane conditions, countless people die in human smuggling operations every year. By charging people large sums of money for their transportation, human smugglers have made a lucrative business out of facilitating illegal migration, often by counselling smuggled persons to claim asylum in the country to which they are smuggled. Once they arrive to their destination country, these migrants are often at the mercy of their human smugglers. Many of them are forced to work for years in the underground economy just to pay off their debts to the smuggler.

Interpol says that human smuggling syndicates benefit from weak legislation, and low risk of detection and prosecution and arrest compared to those engaged in other transnational organized crimes. If we do not take strong action now, more vessels will arrive and more lives will be put at risk.

The government will not stand by and allow these exploitive operations to continue. This legislation would enable us to crack down on human smugglers who prey on vulnerable migrants. It also aims to discourage those tempted to use this perilous form of migration. Here is how.

The legislation would make it easier to prosecute human smugglers. We would make shipowners and operators liable for the use of their ships in human smuggling. This legislation includes stiffer penalties and fines for shipowners and operators, as well as mandatory minimum sentences for those convicted of human smuggling. At the same time, the government recognizes that ship operators and owners are only part of the problem. We must also discourage those who would consider using the services of a human smuggler. This bill aims to do that by reducing the attraction of coming to Canada by way of irregular arrival.

First, it would prevent illegal migrants who are part of the smuggling operation from obtaining permanent resident status for five years, thereby also preventing them from bringing their family members to Canada during that period. During this time as well, if refugee claimants return to their country of origin or demonstrate in other ways that they are not in legitimate need of Canada's protection, we can take steps to cease their protected status and remove them from Canada. This is because returning to the country from which they are claiming prosecution is very strong evidence that they are not in need of Canada's protection. Canadians, especially those who waited in line to come to Canada legally, have an innate sense of fairness and want our government to take action to prevent the entry of those who seek to use illegal means to jump the queue.

Through Bill C-31, our government is also ensuring that the medical benefits received by those who arrive by these means are not more generous than those received by the average Canadian.

In addition to these measures, this legislation underscores our top priority, which is to protect the safety and security of Canadians. The mandatory detention of irregular arrivals, excluding those who are under the age of 16, would provide us with the time needed to confirm these individuals' identities and whether they pose a threat to Canadians upon their release.

Simon Zhong, executive director of the Toronto Community and Culture Centre, has said the following: “Human smuggling is a criminal activity that puts people's lives at risk. It involves a network of international criminal organizations and Canada has become their target because of our compassion and fairness.... We support the government's proposals as we need to send a strong message that criminal human smuggling will not be tolerated. Smugglers need to understand that they will be prosecuted to the fullest extent possible and that these proposals will make this easier to accomplish that”.

Canada is a compassionate nation of immigrants with a proud history and tradition of welcoming refugees, but every sovereign country has a responsibility to protect its citizens and its borders. The legislation before the House is a necessary step to protect our borders and the integrity of our immigration system. It also sends a message that the Government of Canada is serious about deterring human smuggling and the people who participate in it.

I urge all members of the House to give this bill grave consideration and, ultimately, their support.

[Kerry-Lynne Findlay, Conservative, Delta—Richmond East, BC]

Yes. Thank you.

Bill C-310 proposes to add an interpretive aid to section 279.04. This aid would provide a non-exhaustive list, which we discussed here this morning, of conduct that a court could take into consideration in determining whether an accused had exploited another person. The purpose of my proposed amendment would be to simplify this paragraph and to make it more consistent with the way other similar clauses in the Criminal Code are drafted. It would do this by modifying proposed subsection 279.04(2) to make clear that the conduct listed in the subsection is relevant to determining whether an accused exploited another person, and simplifying the proposed list of conduct to make it easier for police, prosecutors, and courts to rely upon.

So really what we're trying to do is just make this a little clearer and make sure that it fits the purpose it's drafted for.

[Prof. Amir Attaran]

Let's not mix apples and oranges. Bill C-310, as far as it goes, does a great job. My criticism is that this House has to go farther. I'm no expert in procedure to say whether that occurs—

[Joy Smith, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

We know right now of cases that are sitting there. We know Canadians right now who are doing exactly that. They have brothels. We have a man who set up a brothel in Haiti. Publicly I hate to say too much because we're just waiting for this bill to get through. His youngest victim is four years old. Not only that, he comes back to Canada and he continues what he does to Canadian children. It's a matter of putting as many tools in place for police officers so they can grab these cases.

If you look at our history right now, we had Bill C-49, our first trafficking bill, which had royal assent in 2006. That's a brand-new law. Then my bill went through, Bill C-268, mandatory minimums, and now we're getting more tools for them. If you look at the grid, we used to have no trafficking cases. To date we have 19 human trafficking cases in Canada with specific charges related to Bill C-268, and we have 55 human trafficking cases now before the courts that are related to other laws that we have here in Canada. Of the 19 cases or 55 cases, what I am trying to get across is we used to have none. Now, suddenly because we have put those laws in place, they are catching these people, and with Bill C-310.... I know right now of one case extremely close to the Hill that we've been looking at for some time.... We can't touch him unless he goes through the States, and he doesn't.

[Professor Amir Attaran, Professor, Faculty of Law, University of Ottawa, As an Individual]

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, members of the committee. I'm Professor Amir Attaran, professor of law and medicine at the University of Ottawa.

Thank you for asking my opinion on Bill C-310. You know the subject of today's hearing, of course. It's human trafficking.

The image attached to the crime is at times caricatured but nonetheless meaningful. For example, it is that of a woman from eastern Europe who is induced to come to Canada by false promises or threats, and upon arriving she's forced into prostitution, just as Timea said.

That sort of thing happens, surely, but it is only one example of the phenomenon. Men are trafficked too. They can be coerced into agricultural labour, farming, or domestic help. Certainly, women in Canada who are not immigrants but Canadians themselves are trafficked too. It seems as though first nations women have it especially bad in that regard.

In this context, Bill C-310 is a very helpful bill. It's necessary. It's constitutional. It definitely should pass. I'm not exaggerating when I say that the people behind it are heroes. I'm surrounded by heroes on each side right here.

The heart of the bill is really those provisions that clarify the meaning of exploitation and trafficking and that make trafficking a Canadian crime worldwide. Let me explain those a bit.

When trafficking is committed abroad by Canadians or persons normally resident in Canada, at the moment they cannot be prosecuted in Canada. The bill will change that. It will enable the prosecution of Canadians or permanent residents who do this sort of thing abroad. That sort of global criminalization is a large step in the direction of what lawyers call “universal jurisdiction”.

The clarification of exploitation in the bill means that traffickers who use psychological pressure to control their victims, rather than brute threats of force and violence, will be criminals. For years, they slipped through this loophole. They could use all the psychological pressure they wanted, and as long as they didn't resort to physical endangerment, they were innocent. That's foolish.

So I'm delighted that all parties seem to agree on closing that loophole and invoking universal jurisdiction. Bravo. Please pass the bill.

But now, as clear as I am in my praise, let me also be clear and at times brutally honest in some criticism. Why is this House so under-ambitious? Although you're doing a wonderful thing by toughening the laws on human traffickers, haven't you forgotten about the victims to some extent?

Bill C-310, much as I like it, does nothing for the victims. Earlier I put in evidence to the clerk, and I hope it is now with all of you, the United States law on trafficking. It's here, and the citation is “28 Code of Federal Regulations, Part 1100, Subpart B”.

Look at what the American law does that Canadian law does not, even after Bill C-310. American law requires the trafficking victims be housed and be given legal help and medical treatment as victims. They are not imprisoned as criminals.

In America, the law gives foreign trafficking victims the right to stay lawfully in the country with protection so they can turn star witness and help put the trafficker in prison. If you deport them, you can't do that. But in Canadian law, we don't have those victim protection measures right now.

Listen to me on this, please. You cannot deal successfully with human trafficking by only taking aim at the trafficker. You also need to think of the victims. That is what Bill C-310 currently does not do.

Put yourself, please, in the shoes of being a trafficked, prostituted woman yourself. I know this is very hard. Thank goodness it is very far away from our experience, those of us in this room. But put yourself in those shoes anyway. When you're not on your back being sexually exploited, probably the thing you want is for someone in uniform to kick in the door and slip handcuffs on your trafficker. Imagine how that wish can easily turn into a nightmare when it happens, because the men and women in uniform come into the room and they slip handcuffs on you. Why? Because the trafficker, for example, tore up your passport—that's part of the control—and now you don't have a valid visa to be in Canada. So the handcuffs go on you.

That trafficked, abused victim who you've hypothetically imagined yourself to be has just been locked up in a jail cell and treated like a criminal. Are you going to tell the men and women in uniform what they need to hear to lock up your trafficker? Are you going to turn crown witness and help them bust the large organized ring of criminals that brought you to this place? No way, because you simply won't trust the authorities.

It's a question of trust. That is why I say Bill C-310 is an extremely worthwhile bill, but it's also inadequate. Both can be true. Pass the bill, please, but don't come out of here, any of you, saying that you're making Canada a world leader against trafficking. You aren't. You simply aren't. The best that can be said is that Canada moves from being absolutely appalling on human trafficking, which is our present reality, to merely being backwards, somewhere behind the United States and the American law that I told you about. The U.S. law will still be miles ahead.

Enough of my tongue-lashing. Thank you for being patient and hearing it out. But, friends, friends in this House, members, members of all parties, I really applaud you for doing this, but surely you can do better. Do you want Canada to be a second-rate, also-ran country? I'm sure you don't. Here's your chance to be first-rate in this bill and in the next steps that need to take place. Be ambitious and beat trafficking.

Thank you.

[Timea E. Nagy, Program Director, Front Line, Walk With Me]

Thank you.

Good morning. My name is Timea Nagy. I am a founder of the Walk With Me organization and a survivor of human trafficking. Mr. Hooper is the chairperson of the board of directors of Walk With Me.

Walk With Me Canada Victim Services, or Walk With Me, is a front-line and secondary service provider to victims of all forms of human trafficking. We have been asked to appear before the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights concerning Bill C-310, which suggests amendments to the Criminal Code of Canada concerning human trafficking.

Let me tell you who we are. Walk With Me is a Canada-wide organization with a mandate to provide services to persons rescued from modern-day slavery, also known as human trafficking. Walk With Me has been involved in the rescue of trafficked human victims in the labour and sex trades.

The mission statement of Walk With Me is as follows:

Walk With Me Canada Victim Services is a survivor-led organization dedicated to raising awareness and providing education on issues of slavery, delivering and coordinating services supporting “victims to become survivors” and advocating action for change.

The vision of Walk With Me is as follows:

Transforming the lives of victims of human trafficking while eradicating slavery.

Bill C-310 purports to make two amendments to the Criminal Code of Canada. They include: making the offence of trafficking in persons an extraterritorial offence for Canadian citizens and permanent residents, and adding a subsection to give evidentiary assistance to courts on factors to be considered in defining exploitation.

On extraterritorial trafficking in persons, the proposed amendment to section 7 of the Criminal Code is to add proposed subsection 7(4.11), which states:

Notwithstanding anything in this Act or any other Act, every one who, outside Canada, commits an act or omission that if committed in Canada would be an offence against section 279.01 or 279.011 shall be deemed to commit that act or omission in Canada if the person who commits the act or omission is a Canadian citizen or a permanent resident within the meaning of subsection 2(1) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

Walk With Me’s position is that this is a necessary and desperately needed amendment to the Criminal Code of Canada.

Walk With Me has had significant involvement with Project OPAPA, which is about the Hungarian labour trafficking ring in southwestern Ontario. Conceivably, as the Criminal Code presently stands, a Canadian citizen or a permanent resident could set up an office in eastern Europe and traffic in human persons to Canadian soil without the threat or worry of prosecution when they return to Canada.

It is our anticipation that Project OPAPA will force the parties involved in modern-day slavery to move to a more sophisticated cultivation of trafficking in human persons. It is our view that it will include having Canadian citizens and/or permanent residents set up shop outside of Canada and deliver the potential trafficked persons to Canada via a foreign country.

Given the mandate of our work inside of Canada, we have not seen a significant amount of involvement of extraterritorial shipments of trafficked persons; however, it is clear that the Roma people involved in Project OPAPA specifically had agents in Hungary shipping people to Canada. Some of those people who were the conduits in Hungary eventually came to Canada, requested status after sending the shipment of trafficked human beings, and became permanent residents.

It is our anticipation that this crackdown and the prosecution of this group of organized criminals will lead to parties attempting to set up a shop extraterritorially.

I'm going to pass this on to my team member.

[Joy Smith, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here today. I'm honoured to be before this prestigious committee on this important issue. I'm pleased to have this opportunity to speak to my private member's bill, C-310, an act to amend the Criminal Code, trafficking in persons.

I want to begin by thanking the honourable members for their support at second reading. Legislation rarely enjoys unanimous consent. However, the unanimous consent for Bill C-310 at second reading is very encouraging. There are a few matters of justice that require our careful and constant attention, and there's no issue more pressing than modern-day slavery.

Cases of human trafficking are beginning to appear regularly in the media. For example, last fall an Ottawa man was arrested after trafficking a 17-year-old girl from Windsor to Ottawa and starving her until she agreed to service men. This happened in a hotel just blocks from where we're sitting right now.

You've probably also heard of Canada's largest human trafficking case involving 20 Hungarian men brought to Hamilton for the purposes of forced labour. They were fed scraps once a day and locked up at night.

You may have heard of the 24,000 women and children freed over the past year in China. This is only the tip of the iceberg. This happens here in Canada daily. Modern-day slavery exists in all corners of our globe, and our resolve to eliminate it must grow stronger. Bill C-310 is a very simple bill that has only two clauses but will have a significant impact on the anti-human trafficking efforts of Canada here at home as well as abroad.

The first clause will amend the Criminal Code to add trafficking in persons, sections 279.01 and 279.011, to the list of offences that if committed outside Canada by a Canadian or a permanent resident can be prosecuted in Canada. I will also be welcoming a friendly amendment today to add to section 279.02, receiving financial benefit from trafficking in persons, and to section 279.03, concealing, withholding, destroying travel or identification documents. This will ensure that all offences surrounding trafficking in persons are prosecutable.

Extending extraterritorial jurisdiction to Criminal Code offences is rare and is typically reserved for matters of international consensus. This was noted by the parliamentary secretary to the Minister of Justice as well as the NDP justice critic during second reading. I want to refer to an extensive report on the practice of extraterritorial jurisdiction released by the Law Commission of Canada entitled, “Global Reach, Local Grasp: Constructing Extraterritorial Jurisdiction in the Age of Globalization”.

This report states that:

...most exercises of extraterritoriality are deliberately multilateral, and those which are not are supportable by general international consensus on when it is legitimate to claim such jurisdiction. That is not universally true, however. It is open to Canada to act extraterritorially in advance of consensus having formed: in effect, to attempt to lead international opinion by example.

What is most notable is that the report provides Canada's child sex tourism laws as an example of this, and states:

...one might note that the child sex tourism provisions, though now perfectly in line with international treaties, actually preceded the signing of those treaties.

There are three primary purposes for designating trafficking in persons as an extraterritorial offence and they are as follows.

First, an extraterritorial human trafficking offence would allow Canada to arrest Canadians who have left the country where they engage in human trafficking in an attempt to avoid punishment.

Secondly, an extraterritorial human trafficking offence would ensure justice in cases where the offence was committed in a country without strong anti-human-trafficking laws or strong judicial systems.

Finally, an extraterritorial human trafficking offence would clearly demonstrate that Canada will not tolerate its own citizens to engage in human trafficking, inside or outside of Canada.

Bill C-310 is an opportunity for Canada to again take international leadership in combatting such a heinous crime. We will join countries like the United States, Germany, United Kingdom, New Zealand, Australia, and Cambodia, which have already extended extraterritorial jurisdictions.

I want to tell you about a joint presentation on human trafficking at the U.S. embassy by Canadian and U.S. law enforcement that I attended just a few weeks ago here in Ottawa. During the presentation by U.S. Homeland Security, the officer reviewed the U.S. legislation on trafficking of persons known as the Trafficking Victims Protection Act. In the U.S. they have to renew this legislation every three years, and it includes funding, immigration, and criminal aspects.

It may seem tedious, but it allows them to update and tweak their laws. I have to say that the agent was particularly enthusiastic about the changes to the 2008 Trafficking Victims Protection Act, which extended extraterritorial jurisdiction to trafficking in persons' offences. He expressed how this change was so important for U.S. law enforcement to be able to catch and prosecute their citizens who travelled abroad to engage in human trafficking in other countries.

The second clause of Bill C-310 recognizes that courts and law enforcement would benefit from an interpretive provision to provide clear guidance on what exploitation consists of. The heart of this amendment is to provide an aid to the courts that clearly demonstrates the factors that constitute exploitive methods. In proposed subsection 279.04(2) I have proposed including the use of threats of violence, force, and other forms of coercion and fraudulent means.

I also welcome a friendly amendment to change “fraudulent misrepresentation” to ”deception”, and to add another description of exploitation as “abused a position of trust, power, or authority”. This will ensure that the language is consistent with the Palermo Protocol and international definitions, and it will ensure that this bill accomplishes what we all want to do.

Interpretive aids are already used in our Criminal Code. In fact, the interpretive aid found in subsection 153(1.2) of the Criminal Code provides greater clarity to the courts on what constitutes sexual exploitation of a minor.

There's also an interpretive aid found in subsection 467.13(1) that provides additional guidance on what constitutes participation in organized crime. This amendment has received broad support from Canadian NGOs. For example, the Canadian Resource Centre for Victims of Crime has noted that the definition of exploitation in Canada's trafficking in persons offence requires clear and specific wording. The Canadian Women's Foundation states, and I quote:

Strengthening the definition of exploitation in the criminal code creates important clarity for police, prosecutors, and the judiciary and hopefully will lead to increased charges and convictions.

Bill C-310 will not only strengthen the definition of exploitation but will align it with international trafficking protocols.

I believe that's very important.

Honourable members, trafficking in persons is a fast-growing crime in terms of profit, and it is incumbent on all of us as parliamentarians to confront slavery in all of its forms, both within our nation and abroad. Over the past few days I've received a number of e-mails from Canadians writing to this committee regarding Bill C-310. By the way, I didn't solicit those e-mails; they came. I was even surprised at the number of them. They want to see this legislation become law.

People like Michelle Brock from the organization, Hope For the Sold, wrote:

It is essential that we waste no time to protect those who are vulnerable and abused, and Bill C-310 is a huge step in that right direction.

Saskia Wishart, a Canadian currently working for the Not For Sale campaign in the Netherlands, wrote:

Clarifying laws that define exploitation will provide members of our legal system who seek justice the tools they need to properly prosecute criminals who deal in the buying and selling of human beings for the purpose of exploitation. Similarly, Canada has a responsibility to the global community to implement extraterritorial laws that will allow law enforcement to seek out and prosecute those Canadians who exploit individuals, no matter where in the world they may try to hide.

Betty Dobson, president of the Zonta Club of Halifax, wrote:

The Zonta Club of Canada fully supports the recommended amendments to the Criminal Code in Bill C-310. We cannot allow Canadians to commit human trafficking offences in other countries, and return home to hide.

By supporting Bill C-310, each member of this House plays an important role in strengthening the tools used by police officers and prosecutors, and in helping to secure justice for victims of trafficking, both here in Canada and abroad.

Once again I want to express my gratitude for your support for Bill C-310 in second reading. By working together I know we can effectively combat human trafficking in our country, as well as abroad. I look forward to your assistance in helping me get this law through, as we have cases right here in Canada. We have Canadians right here in Canada—we know where they live, who they are, and what cities they're in—who are exploiting children abroad, and we can't touch them.

Thank you for your time.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dave MacKenzie]

We'll call the meeting to order. This is the 27th meeting of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. Today, pursuant to the order of reference of Monday, December 12, 2011, we are considering Bill C-310, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (trafficking in persons).

Before us today, we have Joy Smith, the MP from Kildonan—St. Paul—she is the sponsor of the bill—and some witnesses who will appear before the committee.

We'll start with Ms. Smith.